relishing in Water’s adversarial love affair
with fires smouldering gaze – enraptured in their consequential vapour
a thousand years they’ve practiced
for this one short lifetime
a chance to do it right

beyond war & flame
beyond monarchy & botched revolution

He of whom meets my fierce gaze with an infectious softness– together we birth an air of wild kindness
He of whom claims my bastard body as if it were royalty– together we sow a sprouted flesh and rooted noble sensuality
He of whom scoured my landscape and unearthed a petrified heart– together we revisioned two sovereign wanderers into a king and queen inservice to life.

Life pulses in gratitude, whispering a brazen promise to behold us & our enchanting truth.

most days
we are requisitioned by the world,
other days
our worlds capacity is stretched by life
and betwixt it all,
he is my world – small, quiet and serene, a refuge in the in-between

In the midst of our happening,
I am undone
to him, i pledge a loyalty to love and all it’s iterations
to him, I vow to christen myself in desire
to him, and to him in totality

Through out my exploration through life I have personally been practicing various forums of ethical (ish) pre-scripted forms of non monogamy since 2008 – I have struggled with self doubt, self hatred, a lack of support, violent rebellion, self inflicted exile and deep grief in the loss of a sense of self that followed.
My attempts at being Polyamorous were founded on the same broken concept at my attempts at being Monogamous – ill-fitted scripted narratives and a lack of community.
So just as I was a failed monogamist, I became a failed polyamorist.

I had to loose everything and become what I felt was completely broken in 2011 to understand that I needed to restructure and rebuild something unparalleled and unprecedented – custom to my timeline, my desires and the community of which I so deeply felt called to nourish. I needed to be broken to see the reality of what endurance could lead to – a loyalty to love, a reestablished idea of devotion, and a strength in my story – and what would later become an intertwined shared story.

My deepest desire in the willingness to share my life and this so called “alternative” form of relation is to encourage the expression and excavation of personal and cultural truth. To lead by example not the front lines of Non-Monogamy – but a world postpoly/postmono where Humans are emboldened to practice Love in the model of which that is truest for them in their “now”.
I desire a time where whether we love or share a partnership with one, two, many or none that we’re encouraged to be in relationships that are in service to something outside of just the relationship it’s self – abolishing the deep underbelly of escapism via interpersonal connection.
I crave collective where your worth as an individual is not put in to question on account of being different – but in fact a culture where diversity fuels it’s flourishing advance.
I long for a world where sensual/creative/emotional/intellectual/passionate connection isn’t shamed or subject to a warped sense of guilt laden secrecy; where it’s encouraged to flow naturally as it unfolds, as opposed to attempting to shove it into a narrative that outdates it’s unique rise, expansion and evolution.

My Core partnership is not under any sort of strain or onslaught by these choices to live a life which asks our upmost allegiance to honesty. Neither him or I has a limited or finite source of adoration, so in all logic any perceived “threat” is only rooted in the echo of a time where a binary form of relation was the only one taught – an old story of love to which no longer fits the times we are in. This does not mean there is no jealousy or fall backs into the stories that we grew up in. Our relationship has not always been been an easy adventure, and it will not suddenly become as such – nor would I want it to.
Partnership, Love and Relationships take skillfulness, and skillfulness generally requires trial and error.
Regardless of and in correlation to that I have never lived a more fulfilling and awe inducing Partnership, our ability to challenge each other, encourage growth, and continue on in the form that best serves us and our community leaves me in a constant grateful state of deep love for all that is him and I.
Beyond “Good” and “Bad” – Every dark and light moment has been crucial to our process of becoming.

“I said to the sun, ‘Tell me about the big bang.’ The sun said, ‘it hurts to become.”

I want so vehemently to live a life of authentic love, fierce devotion and continued progression that dares others to live their truth, to fully examine their and their kin’s desires, boundaries and the full spectrum of their psyche – to demonstrate a courageous form of love and community that includes all walks of life: the unabashed and multifarious gamut of humanness.
Perhaps we are radical dreamers, but if I have learned anything thus far I have learned that we sure as hell are not alone on this untrodden journey into fearless brazen amorousness.

I dare you to be truthful, authentic and responsible in your Love – with each and every individual that you hold with sweet regard – I dare you to fully exist in service to the morphogenic field of adoration of which surrounds you.

I dare you to pontificate on what it would look like to have your life’s actions be collectively in service to love.

Why have we strayed so far away from our roots to find some appropriated facsimile of so called “home”?
I have inklings of memory: memory of lost love, of dust; memory of battles, blood, and wine. Of words I don’t understand but I still feel. I remember, I guess I’ve always remembered.

Modern blood lines and blurred borders. Unsavoury connections, and disheartening observations. All connected to recent descendants – my own disdain for my living lineages; an eschew of comfortably strayed spiritually stunted children. Rejecting the idea of tribal law, generations of memory traded for what?
Stucco siding and a manicured flower garden. Handicapped by choice, because a life of feigned ignorance is an easy life.

“Bah” I said “Not me!”

I abhor not the people but the aspects of society that twisted the warrior within myself towards such disapprobation. How could I be a guardian to anyone, or any place with such contempt for the present? And I do so see myself as a guardian in training to this gracious Turtle Island. Whether or not I live up to that, is not for me to say.
Those who have pained she who moulded me, she who gave me life, she of whom I want always to protect. I -within the constrains of my audacious hero syndrome- hold such an fierce anger towards them.

These broken ones have unpurposefully bruised and tarnished my bond to what once was (old lang syne). Hands in the air, Nose up, and lip curled I refused their fear of living. Often to a fault.

Although – sometimes, I do this with far too much an of adolescent attitude. This upheaval has to end. I am tired of being an earthquake all of the time. I want to be a calm sea, a night sky, I want to be a forest fire.
We are all connected, and I enjoy educating myself in worldly theology, fable and history. I enjoy understanding its correlation and curious connection to lands far from each-other’s conscious reach. Finding comfort in our shared stories. Stories and stardust, its what we’re all god damn made of.
But why stray so far? Why embrace and consume so much culture, but only taste the scent of where my parentage was birthed? The foundation of my ambiguous DNA.
My loyalty lays not within my given family, but with the one I found; my alliance is with the lushness of the world; and my pride now lays deep in my blood. I’m finding it’s wild flames again, as the dragon of my heritage is awakens. Unslayable, waiting to be claimed.
So far back in to where I see in my dreams; the myth and narrative that the ancestors hum in to my ear, trickling down my fingers, tickling and intoxicating my tongue.

“LISTEN” they say, “LOOK” they demand.

I am neither here, nor there. Too far ahead and too far back; blessed now with tangible anchors, to the world I adore. My rebellion suddenly with a cause. My feet suddenly more grounded than ever. How terrifying.

We are all indigenous to somewhere, they whisper to me. But where? and why doesn’t it seem matter like it should on the surface to most people I meet – could they truly believe themselves to be a cause so lost that it isn’t worth an excavation? Children born of nothing, and tethered to nowhere.

Don’t you feel the pang from those and that of which has been left behind, the ache of hunger in you craving something more? That depressed cavern in your body that eats away at your voice and leaves behind self loathing and oblivion. What if it wasn’t as empty as it seemed but instead filled with the emaciated peoples we only remember in dreams. Not dead, not alive, less they be fed. The longing lingers for something real, something that tells us we belong. That somewhere there is a place that longs for us. Do you feel it?

My tongue is split and raw due to your terrified punishment; I believe these days they call it patriarchy. I remember your lush endorsements to philistinism, all those acres equal to incarceration –
Despite the clever custom bondage for the firsts consort, I never was called to linger in your garden of restriction.
Or was it called by some other name? It’s been so long I have forgotten everything but the truth.

Daddy I have been bad.

The seared hearts they vagabond along with me, as I have for centuries; and apples are clearly the best of fruit.
a melange of pleasure and pain beckoning us home.
Home? What is this home of which your longings are fated to? The extradited damnation embraced as fodder. Walk on, nomadic and solitary – finding home and other wanderers in a place far older than your recollection.

How tired you must be – carrying the sheathe of the immortal soul in your domain
How lonely you must be – for you cannot own me; or anyone at all for that matter.

How it must be burdensome
but know this-

When your ancestry recovers,
as it trickles down your being
when you become saturated in memory
drenched and ragged
in your lieu
your seat is
waiting

We are made up of stories; yours and mine, theirs, before & after – all bound together at the spine of it all.
And one day -gods willing- two old wolves will recount their days with gentle fondness. Mystery and wonder, faded in to tattered pages – dog eared years washed down in a literary sanctuary

– a tangible offering to a world flood with pixels and bandwidth

with fermented red ones dancing on tongues tip, spiralling artistry and cosmic connection – two old wolves past the precipice of their time; composed yet playful they’ll sit in their refuge – remembering and musing;
marveling
as they always have – and perhaps always will.

Most of us in the inner workings of the scene know there are some festivals and events that are child friendly and some that are not. Any Burner Parent knows the scorching blaze of judgement -hotter than any day on the playa- that comes when someone out of the know hears you are contemplating taking your child to Burning Man – OR even have a child and perpetuate that “lifestyle”.

“Oh we’ve heard of what goes on THERE” They scoff, absolutely unaware of the magic waiting there for anyone, of any age.

Deeper in to the knowing most of us Burners are well aware that Burning Man it’s self is not your typical music festival – in fact most would push to say it’s not a festival at all; but an artistic exhibit personified in a small transient city – a tangible archetype of what could be.
For Adults, elders and Children alike.

I have traveled for a handful of years across the white streets of the playa and I have imagined those roads from many different eyes; there truly is something for everyone.

In the summer of 2012 I ventured to ” Kidsville” – a large camp catering for Children & Families at Burning Man – out of my own curiosity and inquiry. After having been at BM for a couple years at that point my daughter started asking to attend with me.

“Is Burning Man for Kids?” I thought

Sure one could find it easy to discredit a place apparently soaking with debauchery as a strictly adult playground; but per-capita is it really so much different than a city? I have never felt safer or more at home than I do on the Playa, I would wager to so many children feel the same.
So many have found solace and release in expressing their childlike self at BM so why not have us all be able to express that together? Learn to love the Childlike self from the masters of being silly themselves!

I wandered in to Kidsville and saw a plethora of giddy delights, a lavish peanut butter & jelly station, tiny geodesic domes, puppet shows and more than anything I saw absolutely elated children – I saw families working together cultivating community outside of the stagnant and tired story of the Nuclear home.

I prodded them with playful inquiry, I spoke to parents, children, extended family and a few imaginary friends/stuffed animals.
What I heard was a collective exhale, expressions of joy, tired but grateful parents – relieved they could gather in a place where they could be Humans together with their Kids.

Imagine a world where Children don’t grow up on a pedestal feeling like a burden later as teens; but rather are treated as members of a thriving community: a tribe even.

I don’t have to imagine it because I have seen it.

So BM & the Temple saved my life, anyone who knows me knows that.

It restored a sense of worthiness and purpose to which I lost – perhaps before I even inhabited this body – It returned me to myself, my artistry and my love.
Part of this restoration was learning to understand that my Child self, my sensual self and my sage self were not adversaries – and it was when I learned to weave them together as Kin that I truly felt joy and self acceptance for the first time.

That being said as a whole Burning Man did not create anything that wasn’t already there but nourished and united the child the elder and the guardian creature inside of me. It merely calmed the ire of their war-grounds and planted seeds for me to sow.

Gods know what a world we could have if our children could be taught such embark from Childhood to Adulthood.

Safe, deep in the forest you lay to rest
The dew soaked moss and twigs, scattered like fingerbones,
your spine torn out, bleached white and curved like a bow.

I searched but fail, couldn’t find your heart, trembling
against the opened cage of your ribs,
Stake your claim on mine, just as well as I can stake claim on the sky.
Hidden somewhere, your heart pumps

A deep sigh of relief. I come undone. Unraveled.
and with my new found nothing, I am free.

I dreamed of an event;
filled with a melange of folk, old and young;
Sometimes it was a dance party, otherwise a theatric performance; sometimes it was just delightful and cultured chaos.
The night was coming to an end and he approached me;

“What is it you fear child?”

The older man with the crows feet and thick viking accent asked.
I hesitated

“I fear a life wasted and unremembered, and a death equally so. I fear failure; and the foreboding shadow of “too late”

He nodded.

The whole event he had been very jovial; like a favourite -perhaps often moderately drunk- uncle. Sometimes I could barely tell if he was human or some other type of playful animal. Now though there was nothing but certitude and wisdom in his intense stare; one that beamed with a sobriety I had never even fathomed.

He gently took my index finger and concentrated intently on it; reading it.
He rested in the place between words for what seemed like an eternity and then abruptly let out a heavy breathe.

‘Your life’s, and then your death’s gifts will come and go like the tides; but if it is a death without memorial you dread; you have nothing to fear.
Your debts to this world will be paid in full; you are now and will be loved until you are forgotten.
Death – when it is time – will be your last gift to this world.”

With tears I squeeze his hand in gratitude; hard. Swiftly then I wake up; with words in mind and pillow slightly dampened.

These are the seeds I sowed; ones that spark, Sexuality, Creativity, Activism, Love, Understanding and Spirituality.

Just notes for now.

*3 Years old: My nights are lulled to bed by classic celtic folk songs, Enya’s sweet blend of cosmic future sounds and ancestral lullabies. I remember something, I don’t know at the time that I am remembering; but I feel it. The childlike contentness with not understanding, but knowing deeply regardless; cradling me to sleep

*4 years old: I cannot stop staring at my Moms Cassette and Vinyl inserts. In particular Guns and Roses “Appetite for Destruction”; which features a drawing of aliens, a post apocalyptic dystopian world and to my fascination a very vulnerable very nearly naked woman. I stare, in private and am absolutely entranced. My first memory of a realization of my desire for women (and considering the context perhaps kink)

*5 years old: One year later another pseudo obsession arises; I cannot stop listening to the NIN “Pretty Hate Machine”, Madonna “Like a Prayer” or “Catching up with Depeche Mode” Cassettes. It just can’t be done.

*Six Years old I hear Moonlight Sonata for the first true time, this is my first fundamental memory of getting goosebumps when I heard a song. After this I was hers, music had laid it’s groundwork in each vein in my heart and there was no chance of removal without utter dismal termination.

(Fun fact, wrapped around the tree of life on my arm are the notes to said song)

*Seven years old: My Mom goes with her boyfriend to see Les Miserables, she brings me home the soundtrack and I fall in absolute love. Again I listen and listen and listen, the words to each song now deeply and permanently imbedded in my mind. The heart and soul and anguish of Victor Hugos story, exaggerated by song and theatrics! My little Revolutionary soul ignites, and merges forever with my already prominent love of music.
And suddenly I have this unyielding desire to write….

*Eight years old: My unadulterated adoration for Freddie Mercury of Queen has grown to a peak. His Operatic vocals mixed with theatric rock and roll grab me by the throat and force me to dance.
A delightful mixture of my early love of Rock and Theatre. My first crush, or rather an idol of sorts. My first experience with the ever prominent theme in my life of being attracted to talent and uniqueness, so much so that I would bark at the top of my lungs “God damn it he’s Bisexual with a preference to men, and one day I will marry him!…. he can have a husband too, that wouldn’t bother me.” (Also my first experience with the irritation of the media world depicting Bisexual individuals as solely gay, or “Transitioning”)

One summer day in my Moms Buick I sat in the passenger seat dancing away to “Radio Goo goo”; the song ended and my Mom broke the news to me that Freddie Mercury had passed away; I sat stark and quite, and then it all came pouring out. I cried, a lot; I cried because his chapter was finished, I cried because his music would flow out new no more, I cried because his soul had faded away in to the next life. I grieved, and with that; I knew death.

*Nine years: old I discover Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Smashing Pumpkins) and Purple (Stone temple Pilots). Absolutely in rapture I proclaim with great jubilation

“Holy FUCK!”

*Ten years old: I find Prodigies “Fat of the land”, paired with Ministry, and Crystal Method I note; Whoa Industrial breaks, Whoa BASS; I remark they sure can do a lot with Computers and sound.
My first love for Electronic Music blossoms……

There is a fine line between being an outsider and a leader; a revolutionary and a lone wolf.
Five years ago I had a mystic tell me that my goal in life was to tear down walls and build bridges. Over the course of time I have noted how spot on she was; this attribute reigns true almost to a fault, an idiosyncrasy if you will.

Forging these grounds comes with a price.

There is a stark loneliness that can rear it’s head when one chooses to hold his/her thumb in many pies, so to speak.
A non comital abundance of respect reverence and close acquaintances.
The forlorn alienation is one that could only be understood by another visionary; if not received by a like minded soul; pretension and even arrogance could be assumed.

“What are you talking about? Alone? You have people around you all the time!”

There laying at the surface of the quintessential Aquarian mind; a deep love and philanthropy for people as a whole, but dislodging ones self from the vulnerable standpoint of intimacy. Coming off as; sometimes the complete opposite of what they are, or what they meant to portray. Flippant, cold; apathetic.

“That was the thing about being alone, in theory or in principle. Whatever happened-good, bad, or anywhere in between-it was always, if nothing else, all your own.”
– Sarah Dessen, Lock and Key

To be clear, I frequently am lonely – and this is by no persons individual fault. I am alone much less; I revel deeply in the understanding that experiencing them can bring me- but also know that the relation they hold to each other is not nearly as similar as we are led to believe.

Loneliness is a fascinating human condition; it’s one of those convoluted emotions that submerges us deeper than logic and syllogism; sometimes far past consolation. Loneliness of course knowing fair well that comfort would be detrimental to the deliverance of it’s purpose; although again often that significance is lost on us until much after we are torn apart. Demolition making way for clarity.

Aloneness, it never calls first, it just shows up on your doorstep expecting to be catered to; and sometimes after weeks of planning aloneness decides it has other plans – honestly it’s integral but rather rude.

“you’re afraid
to let anyone
stoke the fire
in your chest
for fear
you will burn
them alive”

Loneliness is a state far separated from aloneness; one which can occur in the middle of nowhere or even in a room filled with people. It’s an undeniable flashing neon sign to an answer (or a question) you are failing to comprehend; it’s a lesson in humanity in the absence of community, in yourself and your desires; but all and all it’s a god damn bitch.

Although subjective; loneliness is an affliction, whilst aloneness is a gift – that being said it is one that should come with the warning of addiction.

My plight is my choice and any lamentation of said ordeals are purely for therapeutic intention. I know myself and I know without progression, stimulation and humanitarianism I would wither away in to limbo. Though at times it’s hard to not get lost in the “Why’s”, the self pity and the confounding feeling of segregation; the desires for things I cannot even name. It whispers in a hiss, like molasses in my ear

“You’re not good enough”

There is the foreboding wondering if there is any point to the trials i withstand or if they are only put there by myself to say that I have withstood them. To adhere to my spiritual masochism.

All the while I know deep down in my roots; thats silly.

These voices of doubt; sprout like fungus against the growing thicket of my ambitions. They too have a purpose. They toughen the skin and remind ones self of humility. They remind me of my own humanity, and my places both high and below; and eventually they remind me that I don’t have to be alone at all, and shouldn’t have to be.